I took a Polaroid self-portrait every day for ten years and one day. If laid side by side, the photographs–documents of daily performances—would span over a quarter of a mile, or nearly 4 football fields.

Visiting Poland as an adult grandchild of Jewish Holocaust survivors was a vivid experience.

The beauty of the place, Galizia, the southern part of Poland, Lesser or Little Poland, Małopolska, the cities, the Vistula River, the countryside, the Carpathian Mountains, the generosity of the people, was stunning.

This is a surreal contradiction to the deep shock of learning the intricacies of genocide.

Indeed, a great deal of thinking and planning has gone into the development of post-communist Poland, to be both aesthetically astute and commercially successful, to a niche market for dark tourism, (the visiting of sites of tragedy, such as mass murder camps, New York’s Ground Zero, etc…).

Usually tastefully apart from the reflective and meditative spaces of the deeply disturbing sites of monstrous, systematic murders, are places where you can return from your journey with souvenirs of a lost culture.

In the cities, near the historical Jewish districts, it’s easy to find a recognizable pieces of once Jewish property such as brass candle holders (in varying states of polished shine or grime) that imply that “I’m looking at material objects that were once held by my kinfolk and their community.”

Antique store window, Krakow. (2007). 14 x 9” giclée print (2011).

The death camp in Bełżec was the first place where stationary gas chambers were used to kill Jewish people.

From March to December 1942 about 500 thousand people were murdered here, most of whom were Jews from Galizia (the former Austrian crown land that belonged to Poland between the two world wars and now stretches across Southern Poland and Western Ukraine).

Inspired by love and loss of families in my communities, these portraits are an attempt to account a rich exposition of families that I am connected to through my own children and family.

Deal Marquez Family

In my invitation letter to this first group of families, I offered that I be allowed to come into their homes, make a photograph, and exhibit it publicly in exhange for an exhibition quality print, the digital file, and permission for the families to share it on social media.

I’d like to make a portrait of your family, in your home.

I’d like for you to think about and discuss where your family’s favorite place in your home is, and I’ll come and photograph you there. I’ll be thinking about light and stuff, so that doesn’t have to be your primary concern, but perhaps there is also a certain time of day that the place becomes your favorite place. I’ll do my best to make everyone as photogenic as possible with my simple picture taking and lighting apparatus, but dress your family however you’d like to see them.

Why am I doing this?

I feel that our families have a connection through our children’s school, through dinners or parties, but most essentially through our homes and the rooms we inhabit when we get together, socialize and play. I’m a collector, too, so I want to keep you in my menagerie as a way of keeping you in my heart.

Basting Lichtenstein Family

Weisbord Acres: A Land-Community (photo series)

About an hour’s drive north of the vibrant city of Montréal, Québec, in the Laurentian Mountains, is an idyllic enclave, cherished by five generations of a family.

Tim’s Garage

Established in the early 20th century by Canadian communists, their descendants maintain this land community that swells in the summertime with friends and extended families cottaging and visiting permanent residents.

Alana’s Garden at Studio

The community strives to protect the beauty and the natural resources of the area by limiting development and preserving common areas for varied activities.

Frog Catching Advice on the Boulder at the Pool

However, the precious resources of pristine water and private, secluded woods are increasingly coming under threat from development projects on multiple fronts.

2011 Wisconsin Protests (photo series)

February 16, 2011.

Just before the Wisconsin State Capitol Rotunda was filled and occupied for weeks a Union representative for Firefighters gave this rousing call: “When a building is on fire, while people are rushing out, who rushes in? That’s right, the Firefighters. We rush in. And that’s what we are going to do today. We will lead this march in to the Capitol to stop this attack on worker rights, on education, and the American middle-class.”

More than 15,000 protestors picketed around and packed in to the Capitol Rotunda in Madison, Wisconsin on February 16, 2011. The Department of Administration measured an average of 105.8 decibels in the rotunda during this day’s protest against stripping collective bargaining rights from state workers and massive cuts to public education.

In a predominantly African-American neighborhood in Milwaukee, represented by a conservative Republican State Senator, activists encouraged residents to express themselves to their elected officials using dry-erase boards, as a means of re-enfranchisement.